The Resident has received many letters
from residents on the issue of service delivery in the city. We urge the City
leaders (if there are any still left, the catch word is commissioners and
directive implementers these days) to consider residents' concerns seriously.
Below are some of the comments that we have received.
You ask for our
comments on the subject of refuse removal, or rather the total lack of it. It
has been an on going fight of mine with council for sometime and for a long time
I have refused to pay for collections that were not made. We live in Waterfalls
and are supposed to have 2 collections a
week. This hardly ever happens and I seem to spend my life on the phone to the
district officer or the cleansing department or some such all the time. My
domestic is supposed to cart the stinking rubbish in and out of the property
twice a week at risk of his own health. We separate our waste and anything that
can be composted is, bottles that can be returned are. We do try to help in our
own way. However, at the end of the day we are paying for a service that is very
seldom carried out. What makes me even madder is that a company is paid to
render this service and they are not doing this. They laugh all the way to the
bank and we end up with bags of refuse. I have asked what we can do about it. I
am not prepared to dig holes all over the garden and dispose of it, surely a
very archaic approach to the whole problem.I have threatened to just
dump it in the middle of the road, and this last time did galvanise a little
action but here it is 2 more weeks down
the line and no refuse has been collected. I would dearly love to dump it at
Waterfalls District Office but would probably get arrested! What is the way forward with this
problem, I am fed up with phoning and now with telephone calls so very expensive
it would seem a total waste of money. Your advice Please
Regards
Ed: The Resident
notes that you are fighting a lone battle. Council officials are likely to
disregard your concerns, no matter how genuine they are. What do your neighbours
say about the issue of refuse collection? We suggest you team up with your
neighbours and arrange for a meeting with the Waterfalls District Officer.
Kindly inform us on the dates for the meeting so that we can attend. It will be
no good writing a letter or phoning and hoping that they will respond. It is
better to also pay the DO a visit!
Dear CHRA
Thank you
for the residents views this week. My gardener from Highfields came to me with a
query on his rates/water bill. He may query it! I do too, now. He has
brought forward credit balance. Then the July charges. Below is a box "amount
due" The July charges
after the rather large credit balance, gives another credit balance to carry
forward. The box marked "Amount Due" shows the full amount for July $19,815 when
the balance due should, in fact, be to his credit by some $24,283. I am
astounded and dismayed at how many may have been taken in by this
"mistake" Please inform
your subscribers and ask them to inform any workers living in their own houses
in Highfields.
Kind Regards
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Pedestrian Crossings in need of
repair
He is one person who loves travelling,
meeting people and sitting down for a chat if he finds you not too busy.
Unassuming, yet convincing and calm, one needs just 30 minutes of his time to understand why Mr
Petho rides 5, sometimes 6 kilometres a day round the city on his bicycle
for this ritual.
The city is increasingly becoming a
danger for him because of traffic control signals that go unrepaired. "Here in
Highlands alone there are 3 pedestrian
robots that have never turned green for ages!" he tells The Resident. "There's
one up Glenara Avenue and Enterprise, it's
on a blind corner and one has to go round the bend to check if there are any
cars coming before you cross. It's the most dangerous. Then there is the one
leading to David Livingstone School, on Enterprise Road, and another one on
Hebert Chitepo Rd, leading off from the same school. Both of them have not been
working and they pose a real danger to school children"
Combined Harare Residents
Association has in the past month called on council to repair the city's infrastructure. The call is ignored.
School Development Associations should begin to take school children's safety
seriously. A proposal has been made for SDA's to recruit "lollipop" people from the community who will assist
pupils cross the roads in the morning, afternoon and after school. Residents Associations should also consider enlisting some of their
representatives in the D' Branch of the Zimbabwe Republic Police. The D' branch
is a civilian arm of the ZRP that ensures civic discipline and assists residents
in the area. The Resident will invite the ZRP to speak more about this feature
in the next issue.
Residents need to take
public safety seriously.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Public Hearing on NGO Bill set
"This Bill will repeal the
Private Voluntary Organisations Act and establish a new non-governmental
organisations Act which will provide for an enabling environment for
the operations, monitoring and regulation of all non-governmental
organisations." (Emphasis ours)
So begins the proposed NGO Bill. These are the words the regime has used more
than once to describe its intentions.
Draconian, underhand, shooting itself in the foot, attack on civil
liberties...These have been catchphrases that the Non-Governmental Organisations
have used to describe the proposed bill.
Residents Associations will be greatly
affected by the passing of the NGO Bill. Local residents associations, whose
funding is dependent on residents subscriptions, will be expected to submit
audited accounts to an NGO Council, and this after they register as a Private
Voluntary Organisation. The Avenues Residents and Ratepayers Association (ARARA)
notes that the registration itself will prove a nightmare, "...in terms of
section 10 of the Bill (the requirements for registration) are so onerous that
(the association) will not be able to meet them, and therefore could not be
registered and presumably will have to close down."
The Combined Harare Residents
Association as the umbrella body of residents associations like ARARA will also be affected. The NGO Bill will mean that
the organisation will close down because section 17 requires all organisations
dealing in issues of Democracy, Governance and Human Rights should cease
operations forthwith. The bill outlaws foreign funding and determines the
running of NGOs under a Council of
people appointed by the regime.
The Bill will redefine
relations between civil society and government. Civil Society Organisations like ours have played a pivotal role in every sector
of governance in Zimbabwe, primarily through demanding our democratic rights. Far from being 'front' for foreign interests, CHRA has
sought to cultivate a sense of ownership in the democratic process.
NGOs have played a key role in developing the greatest
resource our society possesses: people.
The Resident sees a great assault on civil liberties if this draconian bill
passes through parliament. We support every endeavour by like-minded residents
to write to the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Public Service, Labour and
Social Welfare seeking an audience in this regard.
The Portfolio Committee has, in
the meantime set a public hearing on the Bill for 7 September 2004. The Resident
will update you on the developments regarding this issue. Residents interested
in getting an electronic copy of the gazetted bill should send us an e-mail on
info@chra.co.zw.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Residents Quote of the Week
Decentralisation can
empower and enable the poor, permitting greater choice and stricter control over
their rights. It is thus one way of breaking into what Chambers terms the
'deprivation trap' that is, that mutually reinforcing situation of
powerlessness, vulnerability, physical weaknes, poverty and isolation into which
the majority of the world's poor are locked.
© Ingham and Kalam
(1972:375)